Pope Alexander VII
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Fabio Chigi, born at
Sienna
, 13 February, 1599; elected 7 April, 1655; died at
Rome
, 22 May, 1667. The Chigi of
Sienna
were among the most illustrious and powerful of
Italian
families
. In the
Rome
of
Renaissance
times, an ancestor of Alexander VII was known as the "Magnificent". The future Pope's father, Flavio Chigi, nephew of
Pope Paul V
, though not as prosperous as his forebears, gave his son a suitable training. The latter owed much also to his mother, a
woman
of singular power and skill in the formation of youth. The youth of Fabio was marked by continued ill-health, consequent upon an attack of apoplexy in infancy. Unable to attend
school
, he was taught first by his mother, and later by able tutors, and displayed remarkable precocity and
love
of reading. In his twenty-seventh year, he obtained the doctorates of
philosophy
,
law
, and
theology
in the University of Sienna, and in December, 1626, he entered upon his
ecclesiastical
career at
Rome
. In 1627 he was appointed by
Urban VIII
Vice-Legate of
Ferrara
, and he served five years under the Cardinals Sacchetti and Pallotta, whose commendations won for him the important post of Inquisitor of Malta, together with the episcopal
consecration
. In 1639 he was promoted to the nunciature of Cologne; and in 1644 was made envoy extraordinary of
Innocent X
to the conference of Münster, in which post he energetically defended
papal
interests during the negotiations that led, in 1648, to the Peace of
Westphalia
. (See
THIRTY-YEARS WAR
.)
Innocent X
called him to
Rome
in 1651 to be his secretary of state, and in February, 1652, made him
Cardinal
. In the
conclave
of 1655, famous for its duration of eighty days, and for the clash of national and factional interests, Cardinal Chigi was unanimously elected Pope. The choice was considered providential. At a time when
churchmen
were being forced to realize the deplorable consequences, moral and financial, of nepotism, there was needed a
pope
who would rule without the aid of relatives. For a year the hopes of
Christendom
seemed to be realized. Alexander forbade his relatives to come to
Rome
. His own
sanctity
of life, severity of
morals
, and aversion to luxury made more resplendent his virtues and talents. But in the consistory of 24 April, 1656, influenced by those who feared the weakness of a
papal
court unsustained by ties of
family
interest, he proposed to bring his brother and nephews to assist him. With their advent came a marked change in the manner of life of the pontiff. The administration was given largely into the hands of his relatives, and nepotic abuses came to weigh as heavily as ever upon the
papacy
. The endeavours of the Chigi to enrich their
family
were too indulgently regarded by the Pope; but, ever
pious
and devout, he was far from having a share in the excesses of his luxury-loving nephews. His burden being in this way lightened, he passed much of his time in literary pursuits and in the
society
of the learned; but the friends whom he favoured were those who could be best relied on as counsellors.
The pontificate of Alexander VII was shadowed by continual difficulties with the young and ill-advised
Louis XIV of France
, whose representatives were a constant source of annoyance to the
Pope
. The French prime minister,
Cardinal Mazarin
, had not forgiven the
legate
who resolutely opposed him at the conferences of Munster and Osnabrück, or the
papal
secretary of state who stood in the way of his anti-Roman policy. During the
conclave
he had been bitterly hostile to Chigi, but was in the end compelled to accept his election as a compromise. However, he prevented
Louis XIV
from sending the usual embassy of obedience to Alexander VII, and, while he lived, hindered the appointment of a French ambassador to
Rome
, diplomatic affairs being meantime conducted by cardinal protectors, generally personal enemies of the
Pope
. In 1662 the equally hostile Duc de Crequi was made ambassador. By his high-handed abuse of the traditional right of asylum granted to ambassadorial precincts in
Rome
, he precipitated a quarrel between
France
and the
papacy
, which resulted in the Pope's temporary loss of
Avignon
and his forced acceptance of the humiliating treaty of
Pisa
in 1664. (See
LOUIS XIV
.) Emboldened by these triumphs, the
French Jansenists
, who recognized in Alexander an old enemy, became insolently assertive, professing that the propositions condemned in 1653 were not to be found in the "Augustinus" of
Cornelius Jansen
. (See
JANSENIUS
.) Alexander VII, who as adviser of
Innocent X
had vigorously advocated the condemnation, confirmed it in 1665 by the
Bull
"Ad Sacram" declaring that it applied to the aforesaid work of Jansen and to the very meaning intended by him; he also sent to
France
his famous "formulary", to be signed by all the
clergy
as a means of detecting and extirpating
Jansenism
. His reign is memorable in the annals of
moral theology
for the condemnation of a number of
erroneous
propositions.
Cardinal Hergenröther
praises (Kirchengesch. III,414) his moderation in the heated dogmatic controversies of the period. During his reign occurred the conversion of Queen Christina of Sweden, who, after her abdication, came to reside in
Rome
, where on
Christmas Day
, 1655, she was confirmed by the
Pope
, in whom she found a generous friend and benefactor. He assisted the
Venetians
in combating the
Turks
who had gained a foothold in Crete, and obtained in return the restoration of the
Jesuits
, exiled from
Venice
since 1606. (See SARPI,
VENICE
.) The inimical relations between
Spain
and
Portugal
occasioned by the latter's establishment of independence (1640) were a source of grave trials for Alexander, as for other
popes
before and after him. Alexander VII did much to beautify
Rome
. Houses were levelled to make way for straighter streets and broad piazzas, the Collegio Romano. The decorations of the church of Sta. Maria del Popolo, titular church of more than one of the Chigi
cardinals
, the Scala Regia, the Chair of St. Peter in the
Vatican Basilica
, and the great
colonnade
before that edifice bespeak alike the genius of
Bernini
and the munificence of his
papal
patron. He was also a patron of learning, modernized the Roman University, known as Sapienza, and enriched it with a magnificent
library
. He also made extensive additions to the Vatican Library. His
tomb
by
Bernini
is one of the most beautiful monuments in
St. Peter's
.
About this page
APA citation.
Peterson, J.B.
(1907).
Pope Alexander VII.
In
The Catholic Encyclopedia.
New York: Robert Appleton Company.
http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/01294a.htm
MLA citation.
Peterson, John Bertram.
"Pope Alexander VII."
The Catholic Encyclopedia.
Vol. 1.
New York: Robert Appleton Company,
1907.
<http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/01294a.htm>.
Transcription.
This article was transcribed for New Advent by Gerard Haffner.
Ecclesiastical approbation.
Nihil Obstat.
March 1, 1907. Remy Lafort, S.T.D., Censor.
Imprimatur.
+John Cardinal Farley, Archbishop of New York.
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